Plan a Farmstay Vacation

Across the country, farmers are opening up their barn doors to overnight guests. Writer Beth Ann Fennelly spends an idyllic weekend with her family at Illinois's Kinnikinnick Farm, learning where their food really comes from.

The Haycation

The Haycation

One day last year, I took my children to visit a friend who raises chickens. She invited the kids to gather eggs, but both instinctively drew back from the coop. "Mom," hissed Anna Claire, 8, "those eggs look dirty. They came out of..." Her mouth twisted in disgust. "They came out of that chicken's butt!" It's worth noting that my daughter and 4-year-old son, Thomas, are far from city slickers—we live in a quiet, little Mississippi town, not Chicago or Manhattan. Plus, country life is in these kids' genes: Their great-grandmother kept chickens in her Alabama backyard. Now her descendants assumed that pristine eggs are laid directly into pastel Styrofoam containers.

In this photo: Corn silos, livestock barns, and some 40 acres of crop land set the scene at Kinnikinnick.

The Family

The Family

Something had to be done. So I booked a weekend getaway at Kinnikinnick Farm in Caledonia, Illinois—part of the Feather Down Farms network, which helps small, family-owned farms function as "haycation" destinations, by handling bookings and providing custom guest tents. Should the word tent bring to mind dingy green canvas sagging off a rickety triangular frame, imagine this: 484 charmingly appointed square feet, with a wood floor and three sleeping areas (enough to accommodate five to six people). There's no electricity: Cooking's done over a wood-burning stove, and candles and lanterns offer light in the evening. While that golden glow harkens back to a simpler time, you're hardly roughing it. In addition to downy duvets and indoor plumbing, there's a bathhouse with hot showers nearby. And the farm's "honesty shop"—an unattended, informal store where you leave your payment in a box—stocks chili fixings and locally sourced food such as fennel sausage and peach jam.

In this photo: Author Beth Ann Fennelly; her husband, Tom Franklin; and their kids, Anna Claire and Thomas, stayed in one of Kinnikinnick Farm's five guest tents.